the illustrated p'node

I have of late - I know not wherefore - lost all my words. Therefore I give you pictures, from a roll of film that had been sloshing around in my desk drawer for a few weeks.

In June The Lotus and Self went camping out at a friend's farm, where we watched fireworks, ate like horrible pigs and broke the law within the chambers of our gut,the roseate corridors of our bloodstream and the chemical bridges between axon and dendrite. You can read about it in great detail over here. We also brought a tent, but since neither of us are campers, we neglected to bring poles for the tent. Fortunately for us, The Lotus carries the magicked mummified hand of MacGyver in her backpack, so we tied the tent to a branch, staked it to the ground, draped a tarp over the branch as a token against the elements. And what a sorry-ass motherfucker it turned out to be:


And that was the tent at its best, before the evening rainclouds dropped half the Pacific Ocean on us. After that things took a turn for the soggy. Here's my shadow.


The strange bulge between my legs is either my backpack or my way oversized scrotum again.

After we set up the tent we met this little girl, who, with her gleeful expression and clasped hands, reminded me of a nun on crystal meth.



I wasn't far off. Within seconds her cherubic facade cracked and she lashed out with furious fists at all foolish enough to approach.



It was like being caught in a tiny human hurricane of bruises. It's okay, you don't have to believe me. I know what's true in this world. What's true is what I tell myself in my office.

Speaking of true things, here's a picture of my wife from a trip to Saskatoon a week or two later. She's the one on the left.



The long-haired shadow on the right is her friend Frances. Here's Batty, who was also sitting with us.



And here's another friend of mine. We call him Starcat. He updates infrequently, enjoys mathematical puzzles, cats, walks in the park. Turn-ons: women with glasses, women without glasses. Turn-offs: people who comment on his morphing arm.



For a brief while a girl named Theresa showed up, looked a bit bored, read a bit, wandered off. She seemed nice. I took her picture.



Lastly, here is a car that I've watched corrode slowly over the last five years. No one will fix it, no one will plate it, no one will take the time to come and turn it into a little cube of metal. Instead it rusts, indifferent to sun and rain. I dig the mufflers.